Ep 01: What is Nutrition Redefined

Welcome to episode 01 of the Nutrition Redefined podcast! I’m so excited! In this first episode I’m going to tell you what you can expect from the podcast and why I created this show. I’ll tell you a little of my story so you can get to know me, and I’m also going to tell you about some awesome prizes you can win if you leave me a review, so stick around to the end when I tell you about those.

For those of you who don’t know who I am, I’m Stephanie Webb. I’m a holistic nutritionist, eating psychology coach, and mom of 3. I started my business in 2016 and called it Eat Happy Nutrition. Now, at the same time as this podcast goes out into the world, I’m switching things up and making some improvements. I’m now Nutrition Redefined!

Nutrition is crazy. Dieting is crazy. Everyone is chasing weight loss and not eating great and feeling guilty and wanting to do better but confused about where to start or what to do.

I get emails and messages all the time with questions about food - what should I eat? Should I eat this way or that way? So one part of this podcast will be to answer those questions. I want to give you specifics about food and nutrition and cut through all the noise with practical, easy tips for women who want to feel great without spending their lives in the kitchen or all the drama around calorie counting and dieting.

I’m also going to be talking quite a bit about the other side of eating. Not just the food, but who we are as eaters. I believe that’s the other piece that’s missing from the conversation about food and nutrition, but it’s a HUGE piece. Honestly it’s impossible to make long-term improvements to the way we eat if we’re not addressing the reasons we’re reaching for food in the first place.

For example, if you struggle with emotional eating or overeating for emotional reasons and not hunger, it’s not really going to help you if I just say, “Just eat when you’re hungry and stop when you’re full and eat more vegetables and everything will be fine. Just stop doing what you’re doing and be better.” That won’t help you change your life!

And that’s the problem with the current conversation around food. We have tons of information and science and tips and tricks, but when it comes to actually implementing those things and making them stick, that’s where most of us struggle.

So that’s the other part of what I’ll be sharing here. That’s what I love MOST to talk about as an eating psychology coach, so I’m really excited to help you with the deeper aspect of eating well and not just preaching at you to do better.

Here’s a little bit of my story and history with food. From the time I was a teenager, I struggled with body image - I’m the oldest of 8 kids, with 5 sisters, and they’re all skinny and beautiful. I always felt like the fat sister.

After I had a baby, I tried the South Beach Diet 3 different times. Obviously, like most restrictive diets, it didn’t work. But that was when I entered the world of dieting full force. I tried Weight Watchers, South Beach, calorie counting, sporadic bouts of exercise...I had plenty of shame about the way I looked and the fact that I just couldn’t get it together.

I loved food and I truly believed that in order to look the way I thought I was supposed to look, I had to give up delicious foods, and I just wasn’t willing to do that long-term. So I stayed stuck in these short-term cycles of restriction and deprivation, always followed up by making up for it by overeating - sometimes bingeing, sometimes eating junk food in secret because I was embarrassed.

My relationship with food was pretty dysfunctional, but I was totally oblivious. I just didn’t know anything else.

After my 2nd child was born, I started learning how to cook. After my 3 and last child was born, my husband was deployed in Iraq (he’s a pilot in the Air Force) and I was sitting on the couch watching a documentary called Forks Over Knives. And after the movie ended, I stood up and announced to the empty room, “I’m vegan now.” And the next day, I went full-force vegan.

My husband came home from deployment and our family’s food culture had dramatically changed. But I didn’t look back. I was determined to improve our nutrition and a fire had really been lit inside of me. I fell in love with nutrition. I started watching more documentaries and reading tons of books - I even bought textbooks about digestion because I thought it was the most fascinating thing ever. (Still do.)

This decision changed my life - not because I stayed vegan (I’m not vegan anymore) but because it launched me full-on into what became my life’s passion. After a couple years studying nutrition as a hobby, I started grad school to become a holistic nutritionist. It took me 3 years to go through the program, it was amazing, and I learned so much.

But I had a dirty little secret - I still had a broken relationship with food. I still ate junk food in secret. I couldn’t stop. I was convinced I was addicted to sugar. I tried so many different diet - nutritious diets, alkaline, detoxes, cleanses - but I couldn’t find the diet that would fix me. I was so frustrated with myself - the more I learned, the more gap between what I knew and did grew.

About 2 years into grad school, I stumbled upon IPE and my life changed again. This time my path took a detour away from world of food rules and strict ideas. I went into the training originally in order to heal my own relationship with food, and I did! I learned more about myself, learned to relax around food, and healed my relationship with food.

That’s my story, that’s what I want to pass on to you. Yes, eat better and improve your diet and your health with food. But don’t freak out about it. It’s not all or nothing. You’re not a bad person if you eat sugar. You’re not unworthy if you carry some extra weight. Your worth as a human being is not in any way tied to your size or your appearance. You were put on this earth for so much more than losing weight.

So as I talk about nutrition and also eating psychology, you’ll also always hear that message from me. That it’s NOT about weight loss. It’s not about shrinking and getting smaller and chasing numbers.

It’s about learning how to treat your body, and learning to love yourself, so that you can become the person you want to be and live the life you want to live.

I’m so excited to dive into this podcast journey and hang out with you here week after week. I hope you’ll stay along for the ride because I have some great stuff in store for you.

And to kick things off, I wanted to do something a little fun that I’ve never done before - a giveaway! I’m going to ask you to go to iTunes and leave me a review. Let me know what you think about what I’m talking about here. Leave me a review and you’ll be entered for a chance to win one of these prizes I have set up. And if you win, you’ll get to pick what prize you get.

One is free access to my online course, called NOURISH, a 6-week course covering lots of the basics of what I talk about here on the show. The other thing you could choose is a one-hour session with me for free to give you individualized, one-on-one help. And I would love to chat with you personally.

So I’ll choose 3 winners of those who leave reviews by Feb. 26th - that’s 4 weeks from when this podcast launches. So go leave me a review and you’ll be automatically entered to win, and it will be super fun!